


Talk About the Devils Residing in Your Heart

by Shoshanna Gold (shoshannagold)



Category: Generation Kill
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M, Songfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-20
Updated: 2010-10-20
Packaged: 2017-10-14 06:01:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/146146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shoshannagold/pseuds/Shoshanna%20Gold
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>So lets sit down and talk about it and share a cigarette/ Wear our fears like a jacket full of overdue tears/ This aint therapy or fun/ Its just conversation</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Talk About the Devils Residing in Your Heart

**Author's Note:**

> Written for pjvilar's [kissing party](http://pjvilar.livejournal.com/60696.html). Prompt: "Therapy" by Declan Bennett.

Ray was sitting on the deck, smoking, when Brad got home.

He paused in the archway of the patio door for a minute. Ray was looking out toward the ocean, couldn't see him, but he knew that Brad was there. He would have heard the bike pull up, the side door open, probably even the sound of Brad's keys hitting the table. He definitely would have heard the sliding doors open. So he knew that Brad was there, but he wasn't turning to look at him. Didn't start the usual Ricky and Lucy shit they did when one of them came home at the end of a long day. And this day had as long as any they'd hard in Iraq.

Ray sat and smoked and didn't say anything while Brad watched. He put one out, and lit another one. After one pull on that, he finally said something. "For Christ's sake, Brad, this isn't a museum and I am not the fucking Mona Lisa. Either come sit with me or go inside or leave. Do whatever the fuck you want to do, but stop staring at me like that. You can't fucking Iceman your way out of this one."

But wouldn't it be so much easier if he could? If he could just look at Ray and have him know everything Brad had thought about during the day, this day that wouldn't fucking end. Drills and PT and waiting to hear how the firefight in Al Kut had turned out, how many more Marines they'd lost today, and that godawful meeting about loss projection in Afghanistan. His job usually got everything while he was there, 100 per cent of his attention directed toward making himself and his Marines the best, but today he'd been here already, talking to Ray, trying to understand why it suddenly sounded like they were speaking different languages. He'd even dreamed about it last night, Ray asleep but way on the other side of the bed, both too stubborn to relinquish it for the couch. He'd dreamt the two of them in the humvee in Iraq, Ray turning to him and saying something in Japanese, totally pissed off that Brad didn't understand him.

There was some fucking symbolism for you. He fucking outdid Jung with that one.

He pulled out the chair beside Ray and sat. Ray just looked at him for a minute, taking another pull of the cigarette. Brad stared at it, wanting something, wanting everything. Ray nodded, as though Brad had actually asked out loud, and handed him the cigarette. Brad took it, inhaling deeply before handing it back to Ray. They passed it back and forth until it was gone, not talking, barely even looking at each other.

"I've always known what to say, Brad. Always. I mean, fuck, when was the last time you heard me at a loss for words? There are people who would swear that ice would melt in hell before I didn't have something to say about fucking anything. But I don't know what to say right now."

Neither did Brad. He knew, though, as he'd known last night during the worst of it, as he'd known all day as he waited for it to be time to come home, that he didn't want to lose this. Didn't want to lose Ray.

There were no other words to offer, not right now, so he said those and then lit another cigarette, not knowing what to expect. After a long moment, Ray took the cigarette from him. Brad expected him to take another puff, but he held it away from both of them and leaned over to kiss Brad. He tasted like nicotine, like smoke, with that same familiar, _necessary_ taste underneath it all, and Brad kissed him back, savouring it. This wouldn't be their last kiss, after all. Thank fucking Christ.

Ray pulled away after a bit and took a drag. "That's not all you have to say, Brad. We're going to talk this bitch to death. But, fuck, man, me too. This thing - you, me, us - shouldn't work. But it has to, because I don't think either of us can handle the alternative." He kissed Brad again. "But let's make up before we fight again, huh?"

Brad leaned in as close as he could, inhaling the sharp tang of Ray's skin. "Not a fight, Ray. I can't fucking do that again, not tonight. Just a conversation."

Ray nodded and they sat there in the dark, passing the cigarette back and forth and looking out at the ocean, their bodies pressed close together, exchanging quiet words under the roar of the waves.


End file.
